Badler: Yankees favored to sign two top Dominican catcher prospects

According to Ben Badler, the Yankees are the favorites to sign 16-year-old Dominican catching prospects Antonio Gomez and Agustin Ramirez when the 2018-19 international signing period opens July 2nd. Both players were among the standouts during MLB’s international showcase last month.

Here’s a bit of scouting info on Gomez and Ramirez from Badler:

(Gomez) demonstrated remarkable quickness and arm strength on his throws to second base, both in the workout and in games … Gomez did have some trouble in games with his receiving, but he has an elite combination of quick feet, a fast exchange and a plus-plus arm … He uses the whole field with gap power

(snip)

Ramirez, 16, packs a lot of strength into his compact swing, driving the ball to the fence in BP … Ramirez squared up fastballs consistently, though he did have some trouble on breaking pitches. Ramirez’s bat stood out more than his defense, where Ramirez has work to do to improve his receiving and throws to second.

The Yankees signed Venezuelan catching prospect Antonio Cabello to an undisclosed bonus back in December, though whatever the bonus is, it was big enough to eat up much of their $3.5M in Shohei Ohtani money. That’s why the Rangers were able to beat them out for Cuban outfielder Julio Pablo Martinez. Texas had bonus money and the Yankees didn’t. Gomez and Ramirez are 2018 international prospects and fall under a separate signing bonus pool.

Catcher is, by no small margin, the weakest position in the organization at the moment. Fortunately the Yankees have Gary Sanchez at the MLB level, so they won’t need a new big league backstop anytime soon, but the catcher prospect cupboard is pretty bare. Saul Torres, converted infielder Donny Sands, and soon-to-be 28-year-old Kyle Higashioka are the team’s top backstop prospects. Yikes.

Teams generally do not draft or sign players to fill organizational needs. The Yankees tend to hoard talent, regardless of position, then figure out how it fits later. That’s how they wound up with Sanchez and John Ryan Murphy sharing catching duties like three years straight in the minors. Gomez and Ramirez will help address an organizational weakness at catcher and that’s cool. But the Yankees aren’t signing them specifically because they’re catchers.